


Hands Made Not for Battle

by SarcasmFish (Alcyonidae)



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 17:51:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9283292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alcyonidae/pseuds/SarcasmFish
Summary: A routine evening together for Cullen and the Inquisitor is disrupted by an attack.  The Inquisitor is forced to make a choice to save the life of her commander.





	

Night had fallen and given way to the early morning.  The Inquisitor was wandering again, steps aimless and lost.  Another frozen night in Skyhold accompanied her.  Frigid winds dug into her skin and swirled through her bones.  It was a feeling she could never get used to.  Though she would never voice it, she hated the cold.  She hated the memories it evoked; hated the pains it re-awoke.

There was snow in the air, flakes floated and spun around her, catching in her hair and clothing like pinned decorations.

Her traitorous feet deposited her in front of that tower she always seemed to find herself pulled to.  The candles were still lit within.  The Commander of her armies held long hours.  A strong voice bid her enter at her knock.  A hint of something familiar carried through it, as if he had almost been expecting her.

Cullen stood as she entered, the twitch of a smile fighting with concern for purchase on his lips as she neared.  “Inqus… Talia.  Is everything alright?”  His armor was missing and even his great fur mantle was hung up along the bookshelf in the corner.  It was strange, but somehow thrilling to see him so different.  Like discovering a lost chapter to her favorite book.

She found herself smiling in return, a jesting tone forcing its way forward despite the rather tiresome hour.  “Yes.  I was just coming by to make sure you were actually going to sleep sometime this age.”

His smile broadened into a grin, almost something proud in it.  “Perhaps if Her Worship would find it in herself to stop slaying dragons and rescuing every damsel in distress I could fit in a nap.”

A dramatic roll of her eyes gave her answer, but a coy smirk revealed her enjoyment of their familiar repartee.

This had become quite the ritual for the two.  She would appear in his office during some bizarre hour and the two would banter over books or chess or some silly happenstance of the day until her eyes grew heavy and he escorted her back to her room.  Despite the causes, she found herself looking forward to their interactions while she was away on missions.  But there was always a moment or two of transition where neither quite new what to say to the other.  She was too courtly trained to beg him for company to chase away the night and he too reserved to whisk her in without clues that he would not be rejected.

He took a step closer to her.  It was something he was beginning to become much braver about.  In the past, he had minded his distance with careful measure, born by her skittish unease.  She had stepped around him like he was a lion on a slack leash waiting for the chance to lunge.  Now she found herself comfortable in his shadow and sometimes drifted there without even thinking.  Varric had even mentioned it.  It was a peculiar conversation.  The dwarf would usually tease her about the commander, but instead had noted her easy rapport and relaxed manner the last time they had all met up in the tavern.  She had not noticed the change, so slow it had been, but it brought a distant smile to her lips.

Cullen was watching her, his grin turning to a gentle smile.  “What brings you into my company tonight?”  The smile faded into concern.  “Trouble sleeping again?”

Her fingers twined together, found they were unhappy there and re-clasped in a different way.  She had not come here to burden him, but she hated shrugging off his honest concerns.

“Sometimes I wake up and think I’m still in the Circle,” she blurted out.  Her eyes widened, stunned and somewhat horrified by her candid admission.  She bit her lip, immediately feeling like an ass.  Why would she have said such a thing to him?  She knew he would take it and add it to his already mountainous heap of guilt.

He glanced away, all good humor seeming to deflate.  His eyes slipped closed for a moment and when they opened he looked from her to some innocuous stack of books in the corner.

She lifted a bold hand to reach for him, wanting with such sudden desperation to turn his eyes back to her and explain that it was not his fault.  It was not something for him to carry.  If anything his presence, that of a once Templar that did her no harm, soothed and assured her.  His unfaltering belief in her gave her strength when she felt too small in a room of worldly giants.  Wasn’t that why she was here?  It was something she should admit to him.

There was a flicker of something behind his shoulder.  Not something seen, but something sensed, something magic; just a brief wink, like seeing movement from the corner of her eye.

She froze, tension and alertness flooding her fatigued body.  Cullen had not noticed.  It was late and she was tired.  Had she imagined it?  Were these late night wanderings beginning to make her see things now?

It was a second of decision.  She had not brought her staff along and her magic would be unfocused in its absence.  But she could not risk that quaver of foreign magic being something malicious.  It could be outside the window or inside with them already.

The tender gesture cut into a sharp motion that brought up a barrier around them both.  Cullen snapped back to her, eyes wide and already reaching for his sword.  Her heart dropped at his expression.  A moment of uncertainty and dread tore at her.  Had he just sensed the possible attack or was he reacting to her use of magic?  If this turned out to be a mere figment of her exhausted imagination would he scold her for throwing magic around him with such abandonment?  Would the softness in his eyes turn to disgust?

He spun, drawing the sword belted at his waist from its scabbard as he moved.  It was graceful, practiced, but a moment too slow.  A flash of brilliant light sparked to life in the dim candlelit quarters.  It struck down at him and would have cleaved through his forearm had it not been stopped by her barrier.

The barrier wobbled and warped with a disharmonious racket, unenforced and weakened by her unfocused magic.  Her fingers flexed, empty without the comfort of her staff within them.

Cullen stepped back, reaching behind himself for her, sword held at the ready before him.  He clasped onto her arm and forced himself between her and the man that stepped from the Fade before them.  The man, cloaked in black, was holding a spirit blade in a mirrored stance counter to Cullen’s, most of his face covered in cloth.  There was no malice or hatred in his gaze, only duty.

She lifted her hand to strengthen the barrier when something grabbed her from behind, spinning her and pulling her away.  Fire flared to her fingertips, aimed at the assailant’s face.  Before she could thrust the burning embers into unprotected skin, a brick of nausea cracked into her head and shoulders, sending her down onto her hands and knees.  The magic in her body flickered out like a candle in a storm.  She gasped as if she had been kicked in the stomach, reeling for control of herself.  The fire at her fingers turned to smoke and ignored her calls to return.  She grasped for any remnants of magic left inside of her, but her stomach roiled at the action, sending her retching and fighting to keep from emptying it fully.  The Smite robbed her of magic, severed her from the Fade, and kept her huddled on the floor as she fought the rising panic that threatened to obscure her senses.

Her fingers dug into the floor, wrestling with the sickness in her stomach and the blur in her mind.  This was wood beneath her fingers, not packed dirt in an arena.  She was not wearing an enchanters robe.  There were no stands of Templars watching her every move, assessing her every spell.  She was not in the Circle.  She was not in the Circle!

Her ears were ringing, buzzing like after an explosion of too much magic, but she could hear the muffled din of voices.  She focused on the grain in the wood, tracing over the swirls and scuffs with her eyes to pull her from the haunt of memories and back into the present.

“…leave her unharmed.”  Cullen.  He was still alive.

A moment of silence and then she was pulled up onto her feet by a handful of hair.  The sudden movement and pain helped clear the clouds in her mind, but her magic remained stubborn and dormant.

Cullen was watching her, eyes occasionally flickering to each of their two assailants, but for the most part he trailed her.  The spirit blade of their first attacker rested near his neck.

She glanced at the man holding her by the fistful of hair.  He was dressed similarly to the first and mirrored the same businesslike gleam in his eyes.  He pulled her further away from Cullen, over to the far side of the room so the desk was between them.  They were not taking any chances of allowing them to work together to escape.

Her hair was freed and she could feel the cold press of steel near her own neck now.  Judging by his abilities and sword, this man must have once had Templar training.  He may have even been a full Templar before the Circles broke apart.  The explosion at the Chantry had sent so many scattering.  What had driven this one to team up with a mage to attack the Inquisition?  Was this some strange revenge?  Was someone paying them?

The one with the spirit blade jabbed Cullen in the side.  The commander scowled, tossing a momentary glance back at the man before setting his sword down on top of a precarious hill of papers on the desk.

Her own captor pushed her back towards the practice dummy that sat in the corner of the office and then began to gather ties from a pouch at his side.  She hazarded a look over the man’s shoulder and noticed similar movement.  They were at least intending to take them both alive.  How did they expect to sneak the two of them out of Skyhold?  How long could this man maintain a Silencing spell on her?  Her hands flexed.  If only she had brought her staff with her.  There was a possibility she could have wormed her way out of his spell faster.  Or at the very least she could have brained him with the blunt end of it.

The man in front of her paused and tossed a look over his shoulder.  “We only need the Inquisitor.”  His voice was muffled by the fabric covering the lower half of his face, but his intent was clear.

She reached out for the Fade again, desperation making her search frantic.  The Fade was a sheer cloth she could pass between at will.  With the Templar power applied to her the cloth had become a window she could only gaze through, not shatter.  Her connection remained severed, her magic useless.

Cullen’s sword was too far away.  There was no way she could dive across the desk and reach it before either the masked Templar grabbed her or the enchanter brought his blade down upon her commander.

She took a step back, testing how well the man tracked her.  He was unfurling the ties for her arms, but his eyes had not left her.  No, there was no dancing out of his grasp.  Her back brushed up against something as she moved and an idea flared to life.  Her connection to the Fade through her magic and the natural Lyrium within her had been cast from her grasp.  But there was still one last way she could reach it.

She flexed her left hand, feeling the alien, unnatural ebb of the Anchor.  It felt like tugging on a scab that connected to the very nerves in her body.  When it decided to grow testy it could set her aflame, but for now it rested, glowing faintly in the center of her palm.

With a steadying breath, she threw her hand into the air, fingers spread wide and pulled at that sheer veil that separated this world from the Fade.

The very air seemed to turn a sickly green.  Above them it whirled and spun, sparking and throwing static that vibrated skin and agitated that animal instinct inside each person that warned of something so abnormal it had to be feared.  It was a small tear, nothing large enough to risk allowing some demonic force to cross over and add to their already perilous situation.  But it was large enough to be noticeable.  She kept her eyes away from Cullen’s expression.  He had so rarely seen her use regular magic, let alone this perversion.  If she saw horror or, perhaps even worse, disgust on his face it might break her.

The emerald lighting illuminated the stunned faces of their two captors, their bounty forgotten under this unnatural force that swirled above them.  She reached behind her and pulled free one of the daggers embedded in the practice dummy she had bumped into earlier.  The blade was stiff and foreign in her hands.  It was so different from the warmth and weight of a staff.  She covered the handle with both hands and poised it at her adversary, grip unsure, but tight enough to whiten her knuckles.  Hesitation wavered her.  In the Circle, they used knives at dinner that were so dull they could scarcely cut cake.  This dagger was sharp and wicked enough to cut bone.  She clutched it in treasonous hands that suddenly trembled with teeth clattering force.

The mage with the spirit blade recovered first, turning back to Cullen with resolve in his eyes.  They were too far away to reach.  She ground her teeth together.  Her only chance was distraction.

With a yell she could only hope would bolster her courage she leapt at her captor, sinking the blade in with as much force as she could leverage into his flesh.  He turned at her yell, exposing his neck and clavicle to the dagger.  The steel slipped between bone.  Blood, thick and warm gushed from the wound, coating her hands.  He may have said something, his mouth opened and closed as she stared, or perhaps it was just the last murmur of blood that sputtered onto her skin.  He slumped, the color draining from his cheeks and out of his neck.  Her hands were still latched to the dagger, like they had been glued there, and his weight began to pull her down with him.

The man was staring at her, eyes wide, light fading; full of fear, fear of her.  She shrieked and yanked the dagger back, pulling it free as his body collapsed onto her feet.

The green tear in the Fade above them shrank and closed, leaving the room dim and anything but cozy again.  There were noises behind her, but the sound of blood rushing through her ears made it hard to hear anything but her own haggard, labored breathing.

She stared at the man crumpled at her feet, her eyes locked wide open, unable to blink the image away.  His blood pooled around him, soaking into the wood of the floor and slipping between the cracks to drip below.

Her mind skipped and tumbled.  Wood floors.  The Circle.  The Tower of Ostwick.  Would she glance at the window and see the spray from the ocean below?  No, there were no windows in a Circle tower.  Why was it so hard to breathe?  Why couldn’t she catch her breath?  Though she had not looked away she startled at the dead man before her, as if seeing him for the first time.  She would be made Tranquil for this.  He was a Templar.  She had killed a Templar.  Would she be executed?  Tranquil would be worse.

Why did her chest burn so much?  Why couldn’t she breathe?  Snow.  She was buried under snow again.  This was Haven.  The snow pressed on her body like an immeasurable weight, making drawing breath painful and slow.  Frost burned her fingers and crawled along her bones, making her shiver and shutter.  For decades she had wielded frost in magic, but never felt its true power turned against her like it was now.

There was something warm beside her, though.  A voice with warmth to match was speaking to her.  She tried to focus, tried to keep her thoughts from bouncing in that avalanche of snow, from plunging into that darkness of a tower with no windows.

“Talia.  Talia?  It’s alright.  Can you hear me?”  The gentle, careful sound pulled her free from the snow and the tower leagues away.  “They won’t hurt us now.”

The dead man with the frightened eyes and a shirt bibbed in red was gone.  Cullen had placed himself between her, blocking her view.

Her mind was still unsteady.  She tried to focus on Cullen’s eyes.  They looked so worried and sad.  She had done something wrong, something very wrong.  She had made some terrible mistake, but could not remember what it was.  Tranquil, she was going to be made Tranquil.  Was he going to do it?  Would he?  She found herself almost glad.  He would make it fast and painless, wouldn’t he?  Maybe Tranquility would be better than this confusing fear.

She could hear herself wheezing.  The snow sat heavy on her chest.  She would run out of air soon unless she began digging.  But the muscles in her hands and arms felt so weak, like she had been hanging onto something to keep herself from falling, to keep herself from being torn away.  But Cullen was here now.  He would carry her from this winter prison again, wouldn’t he?  Already she could feel the warmth from his hands on her own.  He would pull her free of this coffin of snow.

“Here.  You’re safe.  You don’t need this.”  She was still clutching the dagger, her hands trembling and white from the force of her grip on it.  He pulled her numb fingers away, prying each digit loose with slow, gentle movements.  She watched, as if it was happening to someone else, eyes wild and wide.

He set the dagger on his desk and guided her to the other side of the tower, blocking her from looking back at the floor around his desk.  A small narrow bench was pressed against the wall by the door.  He sat her in the middle of it and disappeared for a moment.

Her hands were still shaking.  They always shook.  She gripped them together to try and still them, but they only seemed to shake harder.  There was blood on them and under her fingernails.  She tried not to look into the frightened eyes that watched her from across the room.  Her judgement lied there.  Her mind was still distorted, lost and unclear in an ocean of thoughts all demanding her attention at once. 

Cullen was crouched in front of her, a warm cloth wiping the blood from her fingers.  How long had he been gone?  He was talking to her, but it was too hard to concentrate on the words.  She followed the sound, the steady tone, to keep herself out of the snow, away from the tower.

Others arrived, bringing in the cold from outside and squeezing the cozy space from the office.  Every time she tried to lift her head it brought bile to her throat and threaten to send her retching.  She kept her eyes trained on Cullen’s hands instead, they rested over her own now.  She could feel his fingers tucked around her clasped hands, the warmth almost burning against the intense, painful chill in her skin.  It calmed some of the tremors that threatened to shake her loose.  It helped keep her head clear, helped keep the image of that branded Lyrium sun from her forehead and the expanse of unending white from stinging her eyes.

“Keep that door closed.  She’s absolutely freezing.”

“She’s in shock, Commander.”  Was that Solas?  “It will pass soon.”

“You.  Bring me the blanket from upstairs.”  There was a roughness in Cullen’s voice she could not place.  Was he angry?  Tranquil.  He was supposed to make her Tranquil.  Was he angry that she was being made Tranquil or that he had to do it?  Nothing made sense.  How was she to be made Tranquil if she was trapped in all of this snow?

“Did you recognize anything about them?”

“How did this happen?”

There were more voices now.  She tried to pinpoint their source, but it confused and spun her.  A heavy quilt shrouded around her like a cloak.  It was warm and familiar.  Cullen often retrieved it for her when the glacial winds slipped through the bricks and her shivers threatened to end their chess games early.  She swayed under its weight, the chatter around her growing loud and forceful in her ears.  An arm slipped around her shoulders to steady her.  Cullen again.  She leaned into him without thinking and the arm remained.

“I don’t understand.  She’s a mage.  This isn’t the first time she’s -”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” she could almost feel the snarl in Cullen’s voice.

“Yes, she’s a mage.”  Dorian.  The disdain in his voice almost let her lift her head.  She knew that tone.  Someone had said something foolish.  Dorian had once told her it was his burden to educate the barbarians of the South.  “And you train your mages to stand as far away as possible to do their dirty work.  It’s quite different up close.  Much more personal.”

A cup of something warm was pressed into her hands.  “Here, Talia.  Drink this.  It will help.”  The steam tickled at her nose, but she drank as she was told.  The warmth spread through her and helped pull the wool from her thoughts. 

Shame replaced the confusion, causing her to fold in on herself more.  Here were soldiers and her companions watching her have a breakdown in the middle of the night in her commander’s office.  They must be quite curious as to why she was here in the first place.  She went to pull away, to excuse herself and sulk off someplace solitary, but Cullen’s grip kept her close.  She set aside the mug on the bench, catching Dorian’s eye in the process.  Her fellow mage gave her a small nod of encouragement.

“I believe the Inquisitor would do well with some fresh air.”

No one argued.  Cullen stood with her, sticking unusually close to her side.  He was still placing himself between her, hindering her from seeing the carnage she had wrought.

Outside she paused at the battlements, sitting on one of the lower areas of the wall before her weary legs folded beneath her.  The air was crisp and frigid, but helped clear the rest of the fog from her mind.  The wind had died down to just a breeze that lifted and flipped the loose ends of her hair.  Cullen crouched before her again, reaching out to adjust the quilt around her as it threatened to slip over her shoulder.  She watched him, taking in the careful way he tended to her.

“They were going to kill you,” she blurted out, breath forming a cloud in the cold, awkward air between them.

He looked up at her, holding the quilt closed at her neck.  “Yes.  And you saved me.  You saved us both.”

She opened her mouth, but realized she had nothing to say, no words could explain the way she had reacted.  He must think very little of her, this brave Inquisitor, Chosen of Andraste, reduced to a trembling mess at the death of someone who would have likely killed her commander and stolen her off to Maker only knew where.

Her eyes drifted down to her hands again.  There was still blood under her nails.

“You did nothing wrong.”  He said it with such solid conviction, forgoing the soft tone he usually spoke to her with, as if the strong words could bring strength back to her.

She blinked, snapping her eyes back to his, a stunned look widening them.  She almost pushed him away, almost insisted that it was indeed something she did wrong.  There had to have been a better way, a different solution.  If she had only been more prepared, more clever.

“You did what you had to.  And you saved us.”  He pulled the quilt tight and then rested his hands over her own again, his warmth bleeding into the bitter cold in her bones.  “You did nothing wrong.”

She stared at Cullen, crouched there before her with such an earnest, imploring honesty in his eyes.  There hadn’t been a better way.  There hadn’t been a different solution.  And she had been as prepared and as clever as she could have been.  That cleverness had resulted in a death, but one that could not have been avoided.  That man had chosen his path.  She had been forced to choose hers.

A hot tear burned its way down her cheek before she could blink it away.  She gave a hearty sniffle, as if she could somehow call it back out of view, but Cullen was already brushing it away with the back of his fingers.

She let her head dip forward, eyes closed to center herself again.  They sat in momentary silence, the sound of the winter winds whisking away the chatter of soldiers and companions and advisors, leaving the two in solace.  The quilt blocked most of the cold from reaching her and what frost did manage to chill her was chased away again by the warmth of the hands sheltering her own.  The steady brush of worn thumbs over the backs of her clasped fingers helped collect her frayed courage.

With one last steadying breath she met his eyes again, offering a hesitant smile.  “You always somehow make me stronger, Cullen.”  It came as a whisper, but one that was steady and whole.  It wasn’t all she wanted to say, but it was all she could manage at the time.  He needed to know this much at least.

He smiled at her words, only a hint of that boyish shyness drawing his eyes away for just a moment.  He almost seemed pleased, as if he had expected her to break apart and drift off with the winds before he could catch the fragments and piece them back together.

He stood then, offering a hand to assist her.  “Let’s see if we can raid the kitchens for something warm to drink.  There may even be a few of those little tarts from supper we can help ourselves to.”  She took the offer and, after standing, did not withdraw her hand from where he clasped it with such care.

A look of surprised flickered over his features, but dissolved away into a giddy, tender expression she caught only a glimpse of before he turned it away from her.  The blush touching his ears spoke of what he tried to hide.

“I’d like that.”

**Author's Note:**

> The alternate title to this is "that time I was writing something fluffy and it turned ugly".


End file.
